FYI For Canada tank companies are called armoured squadrons, tank battalions are called armoured regiments with engineers having the same squadron and regiment designations. Any new regiments would probably be based around an existing regiment for armoured, artillery or engineers or for any infantry regiments a 4th battalion for one of the Reg Force Regiments or as an existing Militia Regiment.
Slow Drift to War Europe 1984
- Thread starter Farmer12
- Start date
Kessock thanks for the information, I will make the appropriate corrections. Right now no new regiments for the moment but I will remember when the time comes. I felt that leaving these tanks sitting around made no sense. Especially with the trained tankers available for duty, The addition of select reservists and militia in new companies to fill out existing units made more sense than using attempting to form additional units from under strength militia units. But a new problem is headed NATO way, in a few days the Red Army will make some new calculations based on what is happening and life with get a bit more interesting. Also let me know if I missed anything.
12 Noon EST New York City Central Park
Ted Kennedy stood before a massive crowd of Anti-War protestors, he began to speak, **We must bring American to its senses, Ronald Reagan is dragging America to its death. What is dangerous to many in America do not see what is going on and are all too willing to just follow along. We have to open their eyes we must open their eyes we need to open their eyes and we will open their eyes. ** Kennedy pause for moment to allow the crowd to react and they cheer his comments ** I need your help to open their eyes and we must never give up and never lose hope if we do than Humanity and the planet will not survive. We must show that we represent life and Ronald Reagan represents death. **
We must without fail and at every opportunity tell the people of America the truth. We all have friends who support Reagan based on old animosities toward the Soviet Union. Tell them that they must realize that the path to death and destruction is to follow Ronald Reagan. You must accept that many of your friends may not listen to you. Don’t give up hope fail with one person turn to another, you will find people that will listen to you. Those people might be the ones to talk to the people who did not want to listen to you. What you must remember that the path to peace is one filled with potholes and we must navigate those potholes. To fail to do so means death to us all. ** Across America at ninety-nine other protests in ninety-nine other cities people were telling the crowds that they must persevere and pursue the goal of peace at all costs. With the American press happily reporting on the events telling the world that a good sizedportion of American opposed Ronald Reagans rush to war. With no mention that he still a sixty percent approval rating.
The next speaker was much more radical in her calls for opposing the mobilization of the United States military. She called for troops to desert and for workers at the various manufacturing plants that were supporting the American war effort to lay down their tools and refuse to help in the destruction of the world. She went on to say that those workers that failed to do that were no better than war criminals. Then she called upon peace protestors to block the movement of men, equipment and material to Europe. That call did not receive quite the response she had hoped for. But there were enough to know that new battle lines were being laid out in the peace movements march to peace. The new battle cry for many in the Peace Movement, starve the war effort save the peace.
12Noon CST Cavour SD
Since mobilization Ed had taken time out of his normal work load to get the house prepared for a nuclear war. The basement windows were covered with dirt and he had made sure that the Electric Generator was hooked up to the housed power supply with enough gas to keep in running for three weeks that meant the freezer in the basement would keep on running while the light could be kept on and he had taken a small electric burner and hooked it up to. All in all, he had made the family as ready for whatever eventuality might happen. The potatoes were planted and they had received another call from John just hours before he left for Germany. He promised to send a letter as soon as he could. Ed pretty much figured that if war broke out in Europe John would not be making it back. Ed figured that if war broke out sooner or later the commies or NATO would start popping off Nukes and the chances of people being able to survive for very long was slim to none. But he was not saying what he was thinking in front of Martha since that would just upset her more. He remembered an old sergeant of his back in 56’s commenting that if World War three had broken out that most if not all of the men in Europe would be dead.
Kansas Mike Harper was having lunch at a local restaurant, on TV you could watch the protests in the various cities in the country. When Teddy was up on the screen making a speech and another man commented ** Chappaquiddick Ted should shut the fuck up, if that girl had been my daughter I’ve put him in the grave and that a fact. ** Mike knew that no matter how many people in the democratic party defended him and loved him, a lot of other people remembered how he had gotten away with what they thought the murder of a young woman. It had killed his chances of ever being president. Now he was in the mind of a lot of people damaged goods. Ed did not bother to listen to Teddy and a lot of other people were also tuning him out.
The next speaker left the people in the Diner spitting with rage, the idea of encouraging troops to desert and factory workers to quit making the equipment and supplies the troops needed did not go down well. One woman commented her boy was in Europe and she did not want the factory workers to leave him without food and other supplies. The mood was quite ugly and anyone who was opposed to what was going on in the world kept their mouth shut. Except for one man who openly commented he was oppose to being in Europe but leaving the boys over there up shit creek without a paddle was not the answer.
Then Hart come up to speak to the crowd of antiwar protestors. He was still making every effort to topple Mondale, the idea was that by painting Mondale like he was simply a pale imitation of Ronald Reagan. Ed was even less impressed with Hart, he felt the man was an opportunist and that poor Mondale was catching hell for being the one Democrat smart enough to not paint himself into a corner when it came to the current crisis. After all Ed fully expected the Russians to do something stupid and leave the peace movement trying to explain it all away. Ed turned his attention back to his lunch effectively tuning out the protest.
Ed reflected that while a lot of people did not support Reagan and disagreed with his policies to the Soviet Union and his handling of the crisis. The Democrats had no one who had what it took to take on Ronald Reagan. Economically things were pretty good and as for the crisis the Russians had seemed to be looking for a fight. While Reagan was talking peace and all the Russians did was stir up more trouble. America liked strong leaders and Reagan was strong leader and right now the democrats had no one to equal him.
11 Am CST Ellsworth AFB General Talbot was watching the news and he was literally squirming in his chair he violently disagreed with the anti-war protesters that were on TV right now like he had the anti-war protestors who had protested during the war. To see one of the candidates of the Democratic Presidential campaign talking about a unilateral freeze and cancelling the Pershing missile and Cruise Missile deployment to Europe without getting something in return from the Russians was sheer madness. To watch that howling crowd of idiots cheering the drivel that was being preached to them simply made him want to throw up. But like any good officer he knew better than to make his opinions known to people outside his circle of friends. But it was the politicians who ran things and if the people were smart they would reelect Reagan since he knew what he was doing.
8am PST Portland OR Betty Symkowsky was sitting in her living room watching the speakers come up and tell America the way it was and it was absolutely inspiring to hear their words. Portland would be putting on a pretty good show but they had no one to equal the Speakers at the protest in Central Park. She looked at the time the Portland Protest would start at Noon Pacific time and four PM EST. but they hoped that they would make the evening news. Her husband Ed was not going to the protest and that did annoy her a little bit. But he said anything against her being a peace activist. He had offered to take care of the kids while she was at the protest. She wanted to take the kids to the protest but since she was one of the people in charge she would not be able to keep an eye on them. Ed was right when pointed out that she would not be able to do both at once.
6pm CST Omaha Looked out the window, Andy Striet considered that the situation was the same as this morning, the possible threat of Nuclear war breaking out. He was had been putting it off but he needed to talk to his wife, she did would not want to hear what he had to say but he was seriously thinking that if war broke out in Europe she should take the kids and head for Durango Colorado to visit her parents ranch. It would be down wind of some radiation but nowhere near as bad as Omaha. Omaha had at least three or four possible even five warheads targeted on it. He figured the ground in this city would look like glass by the time the Soviets got done nuking it. Andy did not buy into the end of the world beliefs about Nuclear War. He figured that some where someone would survive and Durango as good a spot as any to try to survive. Now he just had to figure out how to put the idea to her.
But today was not the day to do it, they would be going out for steaks and then he would be on duty all night long this was a conversation that he wanted to have with her when he would be their all-night long. This would not be a hit and run talk but one that would require all of his persuasion to get her to agree. She would tell him that she would be running away and leaving him behind. She was afraid he would be on the ground and not in the air if war broke out. That would mean he would be dead and she felt that she should be with him. He had to think more on how to approach the whole situation.
2pm San Diego Ca. The 5th MAB and the divisional troops for the 1 MEF were now loaded and the convoy was starting a long voyage. The expected arrival date was the on or about the 13th of July. The men of the 1 Marine division would share the 7th MAB equipment to train while waiting to be flown over to South Korea.
Ted Kennedy stood before a massive crowd of Anti-War protestors, he began to speak, **We must bring American to its senses, Ronald Reagan is dragging America to its death. What is dangerous to many in America do not see what is going on and are all too willing to just follow along. We have to open their eyes we must open their eyes we need to open their eyes and we will open their eyes. ** Kennedy pause for moment to allow the crowd to react and they cheer his comments ** I need your help to open their eyes and we must never give up and never lose hope if we do than Humanity and the planet will not survive. We must show that we represent life and Ronald Reagan represents death. **
We must without fail and at every opportunity tell the people of America the truth. We all have friends who support Reagan based on old animosities toward the Soviet Union. Tell them that they must realize that the path to death and destruction is to follow Ronald Reagan. You must accept that many of your friends may not listen to you. Don’t give up hope fail with one person turn to another, you will find people that will listen to you. Those people might be the ones to talk to the people who did not want to listen to you. What you must remember that the path to peace is one filled with potholes and we must navigate those potholes. To fail to do so means death to us all. ** Across America at ninety-nine other protests in ninety-nine other cities people were telling the crowds that they must persevere and pursue the goal of peace at all costs. With the American press happily reporting on the events telling the world that a good sizedportion of American opposed Ronald Reagans rush to war. With no mention that he still a sixty percent approval rating.
The next speaker was much more radical in her calls for opposing the mobilization of the United States military. She called for troops to desert and for workers at the various manufacturing plants that were supporting the American war effort to lay down their tools and refuse to help in the destruction of the world. She went on to say that those workers that failed to do that were no better than war criminals. Then she called upon peace protestors to block the movement of men, equipment and material to Europe. That call did not receive quite the response she had hoped for. But there were enough to know that new battle lines were being laid out in the peace movements march to peace. The new battle cry for many in the Peace Movement, starve the war effort save the peace.
12Noon CST Cavour SD
Since mobilization Ed had taken time out of his normal work load to get the house prepared for a nuclear war. The basement windows were covered with dirt and he had made sure that the Electric Generator was hooked up to the housed power supply with enough gas to keep in running for three weeks that meant the freezer in the basement would keep on running while the light could be kept on and he had taken a small electric burner and hooked it up to. All in all, he had made the family as ready for whatever eventuality might happen. The potatoes were planted and they had received another call from John just hours before he left for Germany. He promised to send a letter as soon as he could. Ed pretty much figured that if war broke out in Europe John would not be making it back. Ed figured that if war broke out sooner or later the commies or NATO would start popping off Nukes and the chances of people being able to survive for very long was slim to none. But he was not saying what he was thinking in front of Martha since that would just upset her more. He remembered an old sergeant of his back in 56’s commenting that if World War three had broken out that most if not all of the men in Europe would be dead.
Kansas Mike Harper was having lunch at a local restaurant, on TV you could watch the protests in the various cities in the country. When Teddy was up on the screen making a speech and another man commented ** Chappaquiddick Ted should shut the fuck up, if that girl had been my daughter I’ve put him in the grave and that a fact. ** Mike knew that no matter how many people in the democratic party defended him and loved him, a lot of other people remembered how he had gotten away with what they thought the murder of a young woman. It had killed his chances of ever being president. Now he was in the mind of a lot of people damaged goods. Ed did not bother to listen to Teddy and a lot of other people were also tuning him out.
The next speaker left the people in the Diner spitting with rage, the idea of encouraging troops to desert and factory workers to quit making the equipment and supplies the troops needed did not go down well. One woman commented her boy was in Europe and she did not want the factory workers to leave him without food and other supplies. The mood was quite ugly and anyone who was opposed to what was going on in the world kept their mouth shut. Except for one man who openly commented he was oppose to being in Europe but leaving the boys over there up shit creek without a paddle was not the answer.
Then Hart come up to speak to the crowd of antiwar protestors. He was still making every effort to topple Mondale, the idea was that by painting Mondale like he was simply a pale imitation of Ronald Reagan. Ed was even less impressed with Hart, he felt the man was an opportunist and that poor Mondale was catching hell for being the one Democrat smart enough to not paint himself into a corner when it came to the current crisis. After all Ed fully expected the Russians to do something stupid and leave the peace movement trying to explain it all away. Ed turned his attention back to his lunch effectively tuning out the protest.
Ed reflected that while a lot of people did not support Reagan and disagreed with his policies to the Soviet Union and his handling of the crisis. The Democrats had no one who had what it took to take on Ronald Reagan. Economically things were pretty good and as for the crisis the Russians had seemed to be looking for a fight. While Reagan was talking peace and all the Russians did was stir up more trouble. America liked strong leaders and Reagan was strong leader and right now the democrats had no one to equal him.
11 Am CST Ellsworth AFB General Talbot was watching the news and he was literally squirming in his chair he violently disagreed with the anti-war protesters that were on TV right now like he had the anti-war protestors who had protested during the war. To see one of the candidates of the Democratic Presidential campaign talking about a unilateral freeze and cancelling the Pershing missile and Cruise Missile deployment to Europe without getting something in return from the Russians was sheer madness. To watch that howling crowd of idiots cheering the drivel that was being preached to them simply made him want to throw up. But like any good officer he knew better than to make his opinions known to people outside his circle of friends. But it was the politicians who ran things and if the people were smart they would reelect Reagan since he knew what he was doing.
8am PST Portland OR Betty Symkowsky was sitting in her living room watching the speakers come up and tell America the way it was and it was absolutely inspiring to hear their words. Portland would be putting on a pretty good show but they had no one to equal the Speakers at the protest in Central Park. She looked at the time the Portland Protest would start at Noon Pacific time and four PM EST. but they hoped that they would make the evening news. Her husband Ed was not going to the protest and that did annoy her a little bit. But he said anything against her being a peace activist. He had offered to take care of the kids while she was at the protest. She wanted to take the kids to the protest but since she was one of the people in charge she would not be able to keep an eye on them. Ed was right when pointed out that she would not be able to do both at once.
6pm CST Omaha Looked out the window, Andy Striet considered that the situation was the same as this morning, the possible threat of Nuclear war breaking out. He was had been putting it off but he needed to talk to his wife, she did would not want to hear what he had to say but he was seriously thinking that if war broke out in Europe she should take the kids and head for Durango Colorado to visit her parents ranch. It would be down wind of some radiation but nowhere near as bad as Omaha. Omaha had at least three or four possible even five warheads targeted on it. He figured the ground in this city would look like glass by the time the Soviets got done nuking it. Andy did not buy into the end of the world beliefs about Nuclear War. He figured that some where someone would survive and Durango as good a spot as any to try to survive. Now he just had to figure out how to put the idea to her.
But today was not the day to do it, they would be going out for steaks and then he would be on duty all night long this was a conversation that he wanted to have with her when he would be their all-night long. This would not be a hit and run talk but one that would require all of his persuasion to get her to agree. She would tell him that she would be running away and leaving him behind. She was afraid he would be on the ground and not in the air if war broke out. That would mean he would be dead and she felt that she should be with him. He had to think more on how to approach the whole situation.
2pm San Diego Ca. The 5th MAB and the divisional troops for the 1 MEF were now loaded and the convoy was starting a long voyage. The expected arrival date was the on or about the 13th of July. The men of the 1 Marine division would share the 7th MAB equipment to train while waiting to be flown over to South Korea.
10am 2/1 jul. M+7 Wellington New Zealand
While the politicians were politicking, the New Zealand military were hard at work getting ready for war while one bunch of politician’s were talking up the need to mobilize the military due to the threat of the Soviet forces based on the Shortland Islands. On the other bunch of Politicians were talking down the crisis and commenting that is they were in charge the military would be demobilized and possibly face some cutbacks in its size and forces especially the two land ships. Meanwhile the New Zealand Party was talking up that the people needed to vote for them so that they could provide balance for the other two parties while turning New Zealand into a more capitalistic society.
For the military it was the second day of the mobilization and things were going well enough. The navy had managed gather together a crew so the reserve frigate could go out to see to do a little hard training to make it operational. As for the two landing ships the bulk of both crews would be on board by the end of the day and the commanding officers were confident the entire crews of both ships would be on board by the end of day, tomorrow, The crews also would have some training to do but the recent maneuver slash public relations show it should not take much to get them up to full speed. That had made everyone pretty happy with the both ships reserve crewman. The navy was quietly confident that as of tomorrow full mobilization of the Royal New Zealand Navy would have been achieved. They planned to announce the training phase of the Navies push to full readiness.
The Army had further to go the reserve companies were being gathered and as well as the prior service personnel who were being called up to fill out the regular army battalions. The Army was going to take longer, the 1st battalion RNZIR was in Singapore while the 2nd/ 1st RNZIR was in New Zealand but it did have a newly formed company in the previous year A company had been trained as paratroops. Now the paratroop company was independent unit to be used for special operations and attached to the SAS unit. To replace it a new company had been formed but it was still not at full strength. That was where the prior service personal from the last year would be used to fill out that company. Queen Alexandra’s Mounted Rifles would be armored contingent of the 1st brigade most made up of regular army troops
The reserve units were showing up at their mobilization points, the plans were simple enough all of the reserve units had enough manpower fill out one full company and most if of a second company. The 3rd/1st would be formed by taking three infantry companies from there reserve units to form the battalion. The next three companies would form a second battalion the 4TH /1ST Then the 4th Waikoto Mounted Rifles the units would from the 2nd brigade but that part of the mobilization plan had not been fully thought out. But it would take time to bring plan into fruition, the original plan was itself was simple enough to have one battalion strength expeditionary strength force ready in thirty days and a brigade on ninety days. The addition of a second brigade was simply the recognition that such a unit could be formed but it did lack the proper support units. But when the plan had been first proposed no one seriously expected the unit of the 2nd brigade to see action after all it would take at least six months to get the brigade into shape.
But plans that the Royal New Zealand Army had made were now in trouble. The problem was that with the new Red Army brigade based on Bougainville they might not have the luxury of having a full ninety days to bring the first brigade up to full readiness for the moment what was going to happen was still being talked about. As for the second brigade the word was that they could find themselves neck deep in combat if the commies on Bougainville put up to hard of a fight. What changed that would be necessary no one knew for sure. For the moment the New Zealand Army High Command waiting and watching to see what happened.
The Royal New Zealand Air Force was also rapidly moving to full mobilization, it was having the least amount of challenges and problems because most of the air force had been in operation before the crisis began. In fact, the RNZAF was already saying that it was already almost fully mobilized and telling the press they would be ready by tomorrow at the latest.
11am Canberra Australia Captain Bronte was sitting listening to a discussion by the Australian Army about the problems they now face with the addition of a Red Army Airmobile brigade to the defenses of Bougainville. Nathan was no specialist in land warfare but the commentary was that the 3rd brigade backed up by a battalion of New Zealand troops brought with their two new landing ships was not going to work. Now the Australian army was telling everyone that they had to come up with a new plan. New Zealand was already organizing a brigade of troops. They were even talking about the idea of one Australian brigade and one New Zealand brigade would not be a sure thing. It was agreed that the Australians needed to put a second brigade into Bougainville and the senior New Zealand officer present commented that a second brigade of reserve troops was being formed but it would have holes in it capabilities.
The RAAF was also commenting on the new fighters that were now arriving and how instead of relatively simple series of air battles with a hand full of Floggers with their Mirage III. Now they were looking at about thirty to forty Soviet fighters. The point was that before the plan had been to use the Honiara International Airport, then the briefing officer looked at the Americans in the audience. Commenting **You know it as Henderson Airfield. ** The American officers nodded their heads Guadalcanal. The briefing officer went on to say, **We quietly gave the government of the Solomon Islands money to expand the airfield so that we could land our Mirage III. Not many a dozen or so more than enough to outgun what fighters the Russians had based at their Shortland base. Now the numbers are on the side of the Red Air Force. So now we don’t have the air superiority we expected. **
Then the One the other hand the Royal Australian Navy was in a much better mood, the briefing officer commented that while the Soviet forces were stronger than expected the reinforcement by the US navy would make a lot of difference, the two nuke boats were better than anything the Red Navy had in the waters around Bougainville. While the all nuclear Cruiser squadron pointed toward finding and destroying the Frunze at the same time it meant that until the Frunze showed up balance of Naval power was decidedly in the advantage of the ANZUS alliance. That comment brought smiles from an otherwise thoroughly frustrated group of officers.
An officer from the New Zealand Army cautiously commented, **We can overcome the balance of power ground forces to ground forces on Bougainville with a careful placing of our forces. Baku only has some of their local militia so we could land there where the enemy is weak. Then build up our force by bringing in more troops over time. But this depends on how the Red Army Air Mobile brigade does. If it attacks then we will be slowed down additional troops but there is no doubt that additional troops could be useful. But give enough time we could funnel more troops in. Then once we are strong enough we can go on the attack to capture the rest of the Bougainville. It would take time but it is doable. **
An RAAF officer replied, ** But to land those troops we will need air superiority and that means we either expand the Honiara International Airport or we find some place to locate another base. **
Nathan decided to ask a question, **Why not send in some combat engineers to expand the airport on Guadalcanal to do the job?**
Then one of the diplomats in the room commented, ** Well first the Government of the Solomon Islands does not want to look like the puppet of Australia. Second Havani will scream bloody murder if the Australian Army and Air Force shows up. Third he just might turn the Solomon Island Liberation Front loose. There are not a lot of them but they could be a problem especially if we get into firefight with them it could have repercussions more dangerous, than anyone would expect. But we are moving the destroyer escort Yarra and the HMAS Supply, to a position to the south of Guadalcanal it should arrive in a couple days. Both ships are old but we don’t want to put first line units into the area around Guadalcanal. But these two ships will have to do the job. **
2PM Soviet Shortland base The arrival of two destroyers, and a tanker was reported by the Australian SAS unit which was pulling coast watcher duty on Choiseul Island. The radio broadcast was listened to and while coded there no doubt that the movment of the two ships had been sent to Australian High Command. As much as he wanted to send his Spetsnaz over the Choiseul to find and destroy the SAS unit located on the island. But for the moment nothing could be done militarily. Then the base commander had a bright idea possibly a diplomatic protest via the People Republic of Bougainville, President Havani, citing the violation of Solomon Islands neutrality. The base commander decided to bring up the idea the to the Soviet Ambassador to Bougainville.
In Canberra the news of the ships arrival at the Shortland base confirmed that the Midway force had been indeed sent to reinforce the Shortland base. The Australians would hold a press conference to announce the arrival of the small group of ships. This information would be spread far and wide to let the world know that as the Australian call it a deliberate expansion of the crisis in Europe to the South Pacific. Showing the world, the aggressive nature of the Soviet Union who had began this reinforcement long before sending in the brigade of Soviet troops. The act that required the mobilization of both the Australian and New Zealand military.
While the politicians were politicking, the New Zealand military were hard at work getting ready for war while one bunch of politician’s were talking up the need to mobilize the military due to the threat of the Soviet forces based on the Shortland Islands. On the other bunch of Politicians were talking down the crisis and commenting that is they were in charge the military would be demobilized and possibly face some cutbacks in its size and forces especially the two land ships. Meanwhile the New Zealand Party was talking up that the people needed to vote for them so that they could provide balance for the other two parties while turning New Zealand into a more capitalistic society.
For the military it was the second day of the mobilization and things were going well enough. The navy had managed gather together a crew so the reserve frigate could go out to see to do a little hard training to make it operational. As for the two landing ships the bulk of both crews would be on board by the end of the day and the commanding officers were confident the entire crews of both ships would be on board by the end of day, tomorrow, The crews also would have some training to do but the recent maneuver slash public relations show it should not take much to get them up to full speed. That had made everyone pretty happy with the both ships reserve crewman. The navy was quietly confident that as of tomorrow full mobilization of the Royal New Zealand Navy would have been achieved. They planned to announce the training phase of the Navies push to full readiness.
The Army had further to go the reserve companies were being gathered and as well as the prior service personnel who were being called up to fill out the regular army battalions. The Army was going to take longer, the 1st battalion RNZIR was in Singapore while the 2nd/ 1st RNZIR was in New Zealand but it did have a newly formed company in the previous year A company had been trained as paratroops. Now the paratroop company was independent unit to be used for special operations and attached to the SAS unit. To replace it a new company had been formed but it was still not at full strength. That was where the prior service personal from the last year would be used to fill out that company. Queen Alexandra’s Mounted Rifles would be armored contingent of the 1st brigade most made up of regular army troops
The reserve units were showing up at their mobilization points, the plans were simple enough all of the reserve units had enough manpower fill out one full company and most if of a second company. The 3rd/1st would be formed by taking three infantry companies from there reserve units to form the battalion. The next three companies would form a second battalion the 4TH /1ST Then the 4th Waikoto Mounted Rifles the units would from the 2nd brigade but that part of the mobilization plan had not been fully thought out. But it would take time to bring plan into fruition, the original plan was itself was simple enough to have one battalion strength expeditionary strength force ready in thirty days and a brigade on ninety days. The addition of a second brigade was simply the recognition that such a unit could be formed but it did lack the proper support units. But when the plan had been first proposed no one seriously expected the unit of the 2nd brigade to see action after all it would take at least six months to get the brigade into shape.
But plans that the Royal New Zealand Army had made were now in trouble. The problem was that with the new Red Army brigade based on Bougainville they might not have the luxury of having a full ninety days to bring the first brigade up to full readiness for the moment what was going to happen was still being talked about. As for the second brigade the word was that they could find themselves neck deep in combat if the commies on Bougainville put up to hard of a fight. What changed that would be necessary no one knew for sure. For the moment the New Zealand Army High Command waiting and watching to see what happened.
The Royal New Zealand Air Force was also rapidly moving to full mobilization, it was having the least amount of challenges and problems because most of the air force had been in operation before the crisis began. In fact, the RNZAF was already saying that it was already almost fully mobilized and telling the press they would be ready by tomorrow at the latest.
11am Canberra Australia Captain Bronte was sitting listening to a discussion by the Australian Army about the problems they now face with the addition of a Red Army Airmobile brigade to the defenses of Bougainville. Nathan was no specialist in land warfare but the commentary was that the 3rd brigade backed up by a battalion of New Zealand troops brought with their two new landing ships was not going to work. Now the Australian army was telling everyone that they had to come up with a new plan. New Zealand was already organizing a brigade of troops. They were even talking about the idea of one Australian brigade and one New Zealand brigade would not be a sure thing. It was agreed that the Australians needed to put a second brigade into Bougainville and the senior New Zealand officer present commented that a second brigade of reserve troops was being formed but it would have holes in it capabilities.
The RAAF was also commenting on the new fighters that were now arriving and how instead of relatively simple series of air battles with a hand full of Floggers with their Mirage III. Now they were looking at about thirty to forty Soviet fighters. The point was that before the plan had been to use the Honiara International Airport, then the briefing officer looked at the Americans in the audience. Commenting **You know it as Henderson Airfield. ** The American officers nodded their heads Guadalcanal. The briefing officer went on to say, **We quietly gave the government of the Solomon Islands money to expand the airfield so that we could land our Mirage III. Not many a dozen or so more than enough to outgun what fighters the Russians had based at their Shortland base. Now the numbers are on the side of the Red Air Force. So now we don’t have the air superiority we expected. **
Then the One the other hand the Royal Australian Navy was in a much better mood, the briefing officer commented that while the Soviet forces were stronger than expected the reinforcement by the US navy would make a lot of difference, the two nuke boats were better than anything the Red Navy had in the waters around Bougainville. While the all nuclear Cruiser squadron pointed toward finding and destroying the Frunze at the same time it meant that until the Frunze showed up balance of Naval power was decidedly in the advantage of the ANZUS alliance. That comment brought smiles from an otherwise thoroughly frustrated group of officers.
An officer from the New Zealand Army cautiously commented, **We can overcome the balance of power ground forces to ground forces on Bougainville with a careful placing of our forces. Baku only has some of their local militia so we could land there where the enemy is weak. Then build up our force by bringing in more troops over time. But this depends on how the Red Army Air Mobile brigade does. If it attacks then we will be slowed down additional troops but there is no doubt that additional troops could be useful. But give enough time we could funnel more troops in. Then once we are strong enough we can go on the attack to capture the rest of the Bougainville. It would take time but it is doable. **
An RAAF officer replied, ** But to land those troops we will need air superiority and that means we either expand the Honiara International Airport or we find some place to locate another base. **
Nathan decided to ask a question, **Why not send in some combat engineers to expand the airport on Guadalcanal to do the job?**
Then one of the diplomats in the room commented, ** Well first the Government of the Solomon Islands does not want to look like the puppet of Australia. Second Havani will scream bloody murder if the Australian Army and Air Force shows up. Third he just might turn the Solomon Island Liberation Front loose. There are not a lot of them but they could be a problem especially if we get into firefight with them it could have repercussions more dangerous, than anyone would expect. But we are moving the destroyer escort Yarra and the HMAS Supply, to a position to the south of Guadalcanal it should arrive in a couple days. Both ships are old but we don’t want to put first line units into the area around Guadalcanal. But these two ships will have to do the job. **
2PM Soviet Shortland base The arrival of two destroyers, and a tanker was reported by the Australian SAS unit which was pulling coast watcher duty on Choiseul Island. The radio broadcast was listened to and while coded there no doubt that the movment of the two ships had been sent to Australian High Command. As much as he wanted to send his Spetsnaz over the Choiseul to find and destroy the SAS unit located on the island. But for the moment nothing could be done militarily. Then the base commander had a bright idea possibly a diplomatic protest via the People Republic of Bougainville, President Havani, citing the violation of Solomon Islands neutrality. The base commander decided to bring up the idea the to the Soviet Ambassador to Bougainville.
In Canberra the news of the ships arrival at the Shortland base confirmed that the Midway force had been indeed sent to reinforce the Shortland base. The Australians would hold a press conference to announce the arrival of the small group of ships. This information would be spread far and wide to let the world know that as the Australian call it a deliberate expansion of the crisis in Europe to the South Pacific. Showing the world, the aggressive nature of the Soviet Union who had began this reinforcement long before sending in the brigade of Soviet troops. The act that required the mobilization of both the Australian and New Zealand military.
Unless the Soviets do a really good job of making this look like the USA/NATO starts it, a lot of the protesters will melt away, not all by any means. If the war ends with the Soviets winning, there will be Schadenfreude as many of the protesters and their leaders will be high on the list of those to go to GULAGS or getting a bullet in the neck - anti protesters and leaders as experienced antigovernment organizers need to go.
True, but that will take awhile but gradually as things go from bad to worse and then better then down the toilet that will be apparent. But you will have a hard core while on in the numbers they had early in the crisis but they will be there and they will be the most radical. As for what happens to the leadership and their followers of the Peace Movement in Europe. They will be marked as trouble makers and they will be among the first to go. Although in the early days a fair number will just be shot to spare the expense of transporting them all the way to Siberia. Except for the KGB and STASI operatives as well the others from the various WARSAW Pact intelligence agencies. But some of them will probably be shot or send to the GULAGS because of concerns of their not being politically reliable due to the bad influences they were around in the Peace Movement and Europe in general.
9am Copenhagen
The convoy that had left Leningrad two days before slipped through the Kattegat straits. The convoy was watched by both Danish and Swedish Television and were replayed on CNN. CNN was rapidly becoming the go to channel to keep an eye on the current crisis. Although many politicians in the Republican party regarded the channel as favoring the Democratic Party.
1pm Bonne
The commander of the Bundeswehr reported that the it was fully mobilized and ready for battle all units of the Territorial army were fully mobilized and fully operation. The Replacement Reserve was ready to carry out its mission. The announcement to the West German Press was carried across the world. But American Army was still moving into place but word was that around the 8th of July unless something did go wrong US armies REFORGER operation would be completed. Then the Roundout units as well as the 24th mechanized division personal and its round out unit were also on the way. On the good side there was no sign that the Soviet Union was going on the attack anytime soon. The Soviet divisions were setting up in positions that were considered to be too far from the border. The logic was that if the Red Army had orders to move those divisions would be setting up much closer to the border.
London
A group of Royal Naval officers were looking a new plan over, the idea was simply rather than nuke targets that were already targeted by the the Americans or the French. They had an idea a sort of shot across the bows nuclear strike, it was dangerous but it did have a certain degree of logic. The IRBM’s the 251 SS-20’S and the SS-4’s 224 missiles were a real danger to Europe and the idea was simple there were three hundred and seventy-seven launch sites for the SS-20’s and 64 for the SS-4’s. The idea was simple at a point after the Soviet Union started to use tactical nukes but had not used their IRBM’s. A strike could be carried out on those sites. The SS-20 sites were just out there in the open as soft a site as possible. The problem was that they might or might not be occupied but one thing was clear that over the last few days those launch sites had the SS-20’s sitting on those same launch sites. The SS-4’s were still sitting in their bunkers. But the expectation was that if a strike from the Theater IRBM’s those missiles would be on the outside of those bunkers waiting for orders to go. There was total of four hundred and fifty-six targets to be hit. This meant that the submarines would have to be as close as possible to the Soviet Union.
The plan was simple but it would require every warhead the Royal Navy had. With the new Chevaline nuclear system limited the number of warheads to one hundred and twenty-eight warheads. Those warheads were not all that accurate but against a soft target with roughly a kilometer CER. If they could get the two new Trident submarines with their better accuracy, with a CER of roughly four hundred meters would be devastating to the SS-20’s out in the open and hopefully the SS-4 would be positioned to be used quickly. The total of three hundred and eighty-four warheads would make the plan work with a total of five hundred and twelve warheads. Would leave bit of over kill but there were fifteen to twenty or so bases. You could double up the warheads on the bases to make sure that any stockpiles of SS-20’s and SS-4’s were destroyed. But first they would have to talk Margaret Thatcher to get her approval and then they would have to go and get Ronald Reagan and the US Navy in agreement. This could take at least a few days but planning would go on.
2pm Conakry
A squadron of Soviet warships arrived in the harbor a cruiser the Admiral Zozulia a Kresta I class cruiser as well as two destroyers, the Kashin class ship Strogiy and the Kotlin class destroyer Bravyy and two support ships anchored in the harbor. At the same time two ships that had left Murmansk were still headed south. The western embassies immediately informed their respective governments. NATO’s naval staff were now considering the threat posed by this force of Soviet Warships to the oil supplies of Europe since the shipping route carrying most of that oil to Europe ran right by Conakry. 10 am Washington DC
Despite the crisis in Europe operations were slowed down a bit in the Pentagon. The senior command had decided that crisis or no crisis people needed a break. So, while operations were ongoing and people were keeping an eye on what was happening many of the Pentagon personnel were at home relaxing just a bit. Others would be given down time when the 4th rolled around. Reagan received his daily briefing, but nothing else was going on in the White House. Nancy had put her foot down and she had told everyone that Ronnie needed a break and this Sunday was going to be that day. But for the men and women of Military Air Command were getting no rest. The flow of troops and equipment was not slowing down it was moving at a steady rate and as more of the allies had their troops in place transports from other countries in Europe moved more troops to Europe.
11am EST Key Largo
The commander of the 101st Air Assault division reported to the Pentagon that all of his troops were all in place. They would a few days to settle in but he had ordered that some of the divisions attack helicopter to start making patrols and several platoons of infantry were loaded onto some of the transport helicopters. The idea was to see just how long it would take transport helicopter with a combat load of troops to get to various locations.
9am PST Macchord AFB
Columns of trucks arrived carrying troops from the 1st brigade of the 9th infantry division. They would be the first troops to be sent Greece and it was expected that the lift of the 9TH itself would take roughly two weeks. The rest of the forces attached to the division would take longer to carry out.
The convoy that had left Leningrad two days before slipped through the Kattegat straits. The convoy was watched by both Danish and Swedish Television and were replayed on CNN. CNN was rapidly becoming the go to channel to keep an eye on the current crisis. Although many politicians in the Republican party regarded the channel as favoring the Democratic Party.
1pm Bonne
The commander of the Bundeswehr reported that the it was fully mobilized and ready for battle all units of the Territorial army were fully mobilized and fully operation. The Replacement Reserve was ready to carry out its mission. The announcement to the West German Press was carried across the world. But American Army was still moving into place but word was that around the 8th of July unless something did go wrong US armies REFORGER operation would be completed. Then the Roundout units as well as the 24th mechanized division personal and its round out unit were also on the way. On the good side there was no sign that the Soviet Union was going on the attack anytime soon. The Soviet divisions were setting up in positions that were considered to be too far from the border. The logic was that if the Red Army had orders to move those divisions would be setting up much closer to the border.
London
A group of Royal Naval officers were looking a new plan over, the idea was simply rather than nuke targets that were already targeted by the the Americans or the French. They had an idea a sort of shot across the bows nuclear strike, it was dangerous but it did have a certain degree of logic. The IRBM’s the 251 SS-20’S and the SS-4’s 224 missiles were a real danger to Europe and the idea was simple there were three hundred and seventy-seven launch sites for the SS-20’s and 64 for the SS-4’s. The idea was simple at a point after the Soviet Union started to use tactical nukes but had not used their IRBM’s. A strike could be carried out on those sites. The SS-20 sites were just out there in the open as soft a site as possible. The problem was that they might or might not be occupied but one thing was clear that over the last few days those launch sites had the SS-20’s sitting on those same launch sites. The SS-4’s were still sitting in their bunkers. But the expectation was that if a strike from the Theater IRBM’s those missiles would be on the outside of those bunkers waiting for orders to go. There was total of four hundred and fifty-six targets to be hit. This meant that the submarines would have to be as close as possible to the Soviet Union.
The plan was simple but it would require every warhead the Royal Navy had. With the new Chevaline nuclear system limited the number of warheads to one hundred and twenty-eight warheads. Those warheads were not all that accurate but against a soft target with roughly a kilometer CER. If they could get the two new Trident submarines with their better accuracy, with a CER of roughly four hundred meters would be devastating to the SS-20’s out in the open and hopefully the SS-4 would be positioned to be used quickly. The total of three hundred and eighty-four warheads would make the plan work with a total of five hundred and twelve warheads. Would leave bit of over kill but there were fifteen to twenty or so bases. You could double up the warheads on the bases to make sure that any stockpiles of SS-20’s and SS-4’s were destroyed. But first they would have to talk Margaret Thatcher to get her approval and then they would have to go and get Ronald Reagan and the US Navy in agreement. This could take at least a few days but planning would go on.
2pm Conakry
A squadron of Soviet warships arrived in the harbor a cruiser the Admiral Zozulia a Kresta I class cruiser as well as two destroyers, the Kashin class ship Strogiy and the Kotlin class destroyer Bravyy and two support ships anchored in the harbor. At the same time two ships that had left Murmansk were still headed south. The western embassies immediately informed their respective governments. NATO’s naval staff were now considering the threat posed by this force of Soviet Warships to the oil supplies of Europe since the shipping route carrying most of that oil to Europe ran right by Conakry. 10 am Washington DC
Despite the crisis in Europe operations were slowed down a bit in the Pentagon. The senior command had decided that crisis or no crisis people needed a break. So, while operations were ongoing and people were keeping an eye on what was happening many of the Pentagon personnel were at home relaxing just a bit. Others would be given down time when the 4th rolled around. Reagan received his daily briefing, but nothing else was going on in the White House. Nancy had put her foot down and she had told everyone that Ronnie needed a break and this Sunday was going to be that day. But for the men and women of Military Air Command were getting no rest. The flow of troops and equipment was not slowing down it was moving at a steady rate and as more of the allies had their troops in place transports from other countries in Europe moved more troops to Europe.
11am EST Key Largo
The commander of the 101st Air Assault division reported to the Pentagon that all of his troops were all in place. They would a few days to settle in but he had ordered that some of the divisions attack helicopter to start making patrols and several platoons of infantry were loaded onto some of the transport helicopters. The idea was to see just how long it would take transport helicopter with a combat load of troops to get to various locations.
9am PST Macchord AFB
Columns of trucks arrived carrying troops from the 1st brigade of the 9th infantry division. They would be the first troops to be sent Greece and it was expected that the lift of the 9TH itself would take roughly two weeks. The rest of the forces attached to the division would take longer to carry out.
That's going to have to be a verrrrrrry persuasive argument to convince Thatcher to discard the independent strategic nuclear deterrent that way. There might be redundancy in targeting, but the entire point of Polaris (and Trident) is that they aren't US or French, and entirely under UK control. There would also be provision for the RN to work with the US SIOP to remove some of that redundancy.
Mumbles sorry about not responding sooner I was at work and it was busy so I had to wait until I made it home. You are correct about that, but its all about selling the idea. You could argue that if your attack succeeds then a large portion of the warheads targeting the United Kingdom could get vaporized. Thus saving the lives of millions of United Kingdom citizens. You can also point out that if the Soviet IRBM's missiles get launched before you can strike well you have the all those missiles just waiting for what ever targets were missed in the first strike. You can sell the idea as a way of having a reserve force for NATO.
Unknown similar apologies, well I am trying to keep things blurred a bit so that you will see the kind of twists and turns while giving you the idea that it just might turn out not be not so bad, then again maybe it will. I believe that the story of how you ended up where you are is just as important as what happens when the shit hits the fan. Oh by the way you may have some minor shit storms along the way.
Unknown similar apologies, well I am trying to keep things blurred a bit so that you will see the kind of twists and turns while giving you the idea that it just might turn out not be not so bad, then again maybe it will. I believe that the story of how you ended up where you are is just as important as what happens when the shit hits the fan. Oh by the way you may have some minor shit storms along the way.
Chapter 12 We will make the Blood Flow in Boston this Weekend
1 PM Jul 3/2 M+8 Wellington NZ
The New Zealand’s Air Force announced it was fully mobilize and instigating a training program to bring it up to full combat readiness while the Navy announce that all ships that needed reservists to be fully operations were fully manned and ready to be undergo a round of intensive training. While the remaining small number shortfalls were in support positions and most of them would be fully manned within a day or two at most.
The Army made it quite clear that while progress had been made to gather up the reserve force some units were still enroute to training areas. So that it would take a week or so before all the units would fully be gathered together.
3PM Canberra Australia
Australia was also moving on its mobilization efforts but it was not moving at the same pace as the New Zealand militaries but still the press briefings were stating all the units would be in place and in training in a week to ten days.
Shortland Naval base The two Victor class submarines arrived in the port and they rapidly anchored right after that supplies were loaded on board so that the two submarines would be ready to go at a moment’s notice. The LA class submarine Portland that had been following the two Victors began to patrol to the north of Bougainville. COMSUBPAC was not about to allow the two Victors to double back north so for now the Portland’s mission was to watch for that to happen.
6AM Diego Garcia
The ships loaded with the prepositioned equipment for CENTCOM were now on the way to Greece. The arrival time was roughly eight days from today and the passage through the Suez Canal had the approval of the Egyptian Government.
10AM Russian border into Poland The satellite photos of the railroad traffic showed the steady flow of fully loaded trains heading west and an equally steady flow of empty trains heading east. The analysts were making counts and gathering information to the information up to day on just how many divisions were on the way West and how many had already arrived.
10 am Bonne Clothing of the World Bonne Germany
Rolf was surprised to see his contact walk into the store, this really rattled him. His contacts normal method was a cryptic phone call and then a meeting someplace with hundreds of people around so that if necessary you could fade into the crowds. The message was short and to the point, a mission was being planned. The RPG-7’s and AK-47”s as well as the ammunition would be used for a mission. You need to be ready to deliver the weapons on short notice. The Reactionary Cells had a pair of high priority targets that would be in Bonne next week. No names were mentioned but Rolf was used to that, when the attack was carried out he would know that it was the supplies that were moved through his store were the source of the destruction.
11 AM NATO HQ General Rogers was in a pretty good mood, most of the armies of the NATO alliance as relating to the Central Front were mobilized. Only the France which had pretty large army it was, still mobilizing and American whose REFORGER operation was still ongoing. But planes were being diverted to move the rest of the REFORGER across the Atlantic. The without the additional planes the operation should take fifteen days maybe sixteen. The additional planes would reduce that to maybe twelve or thirteen days. That meant that REFOGER would be completed no later than Saturday. Add on that the 24th Mech had arrived would be totally unloaded by tomorrow and two of the convoys would be unloaded while the third two ship convoy would be finished the day after tomorrow. That would mean that almost all of the equipment for the 1st Cavalry and 2ND Armored division would have arrived.
The other bit of really good news was that with the arrival of the M-1’s for the 1st Calvary was on the RO/RO ships that would give Central Command a full three divisions with M-1 Abrams. That would mean that all the M-60A3 that were formerly the assigned to the 1St Cav and the 2nd Armored could to be used for other missions like maybe giving the tanks to a guard division and putting the M-48A5’s into the war reserve. That was an idea maybe he should have someone take a closer look at the idea. Looking around the room he commented on the idea and there was a positive response on the idea. Then General Rogers turned his attention to the next problem.
His chief of staff informed him of a special message from the Pentagon. The 9th was to be shipped to Greece which he was already aware of but they were requesting that at least one battalion of M-60a1 or M-60a3 be assigned to fill out a Guard unit being sent to Greece. The reason is that the General Rogers was well aware of why the 9th and her attached units were on the way to Greece. Also, since he was the senior commander of NATO so he had to take in consideration all of NATO’s front areas. Greece and Turkey, Balkan front was one of those frontline areas. What they were requesting was for one battalion to make the arrival of one of the attached units a little easier.
One of the other officers, who was watching General Rogers consider the request, commented, **Sir if we move tanks we have in the war reserve to Greece we will weaken Central Command.** General Rogers considered the man for a second and he replied, **I am the senior officer for all of NATO, so I cannot always short changed other fronts just for Central Command.** The other officers in the room were not convince then General Rogers stated, **We have to keep Greece happy since if we don’t she could decide not to mobilize or to cease her mobilization. The 9th is going to keep her happy and since it take a lot of planes to move an infantry division like the 9th so by reducing the number of flights needed to bring the whole division over to Greece we can increase the number of troops were can ship to the Central Command.**
** In doing so we help the alliance and remember if the Red Army and its Warsaw Pact armies can open the Dardanelles for the Soviet Black Seas Fleet, we would be having one hell of a fight in the Med. One we don’t need. The movement of the 9th is strategically necessary to bolster NATO’s southern flank. So, I will order that all tanks and M-113 and its variants that the 9th and attached units need to be taken from the war reserves and shipped to Greece. This will make the movement of the 9th division and it attached and affiliated units even easier. **
Those officers that disagreed with the decision were grumbling but not where General Rogers could hear it. Then General Rogers looked around the room, he had made the decision no he had to have someone make sure the mission of getting the tanks and APC’s. General Bertram has other missions to carry out but he was the one man that Rogers trusted to take care of the special mission and this was the current special mission. **Archie, you’re the one to take care of this little job. ** General Bertram cringed inwardly since he was not pleased with idea of moving tanks and APC’s from the Central Front to what he considered a purely secondary front. But he was too good of an officer not to carry out his orders to the letter and with all possible speed. General Bertram replied **Yes sir. ** Then he left the room to assign this mission to one of his staff members who would do all the heavy lifting.
As the rest of the officers filed out of the officer, General Rogers aide handed him the itinerary for the Secretary of Defenses visit next week which included a meeting with Chancellor Kohl in Bonne.
1 PM Jul 3/2 M+8 Wellington NZ
The New Zealand’s Air Force announced it was fully mobilize and instigating a training program to bring it up to full combat readiness while the Navy announce that all ships that needed reservists to be fully operations were fully manned and ready to be undergo a round of intensive training. While the remaining small number shortfalls were in support positions and most of them would be fully manned within a day or two at most.
The Army made it quite clear that while progress had been made to gather up the reserve force some units were still enroute to training areas. So that it would take a week or so before all the units would fully be gathered together.
3PM Canberra Australia
Australia was also moving on its mobilization efforts but it was not moving at the same pace as the New Zealand militaries but still the press briefings were stating all the units would be in place and in training in a week to ten days.
Shortland Naval base The two Victor class submarines arrived in the port and they rapidly anchored right after that supplies were loaded on board so that the two submarines would be ready to go at a moment’s notice. The LA class submarine Portland that had been following the two Victors began to patrol to the north of Bougainville. COMSUBPAC was not about to allow the two Victors to double back north so for now the Portland’s mission was to watch for that to happen.
6AM Diego Garcia
The ships loaded with the prepositioned equipment for CENTCOM were now on the way to Greece. The arrival time was roughly eight days from today and the passage through the Suez Canal had the approval of the Egyptian Government.
10AM Russian border into Poland The satellite photos of the railroad traffic showed the steady flow of fully loaded trains heading west and an equally steady flow of empty trains heading east. The analysts were making counts and gathering information to the information up to day on just how many divisions were on the way West and how many had already arrived.
10 am Bonne Clothing of the World Bonne Germany
Rolf was surprised to see his contact walk into the store, this really rattled him. His contacts normal method was a cryptic phone call and then a meeting someplace with hundreds of people around so that if necessary you could fade into the crowds. The message was short and to the point, a mission was being planned. The RPG-7’s and AK-47”s as well as the ammunition would be used for a mission. You need to be ready to deliver the weapons on short notice. The Reactionary Cells had a pair of high priority targets that would be in Bonne next week. No names were mentioned but Rolf was used to that, when the attack was carried out he would know that it was the supplies that were moved through his store were the source of the destruction.
11 AM NATO HQ General Rogers was in a pretty good mood, most of the armies of the NATO alliance as relating to the Central Front were mobilized. Only the France which had pretty large army it was, still mobilizing and American whose REFORGER operation was still ongoing. But planes were being diverted to move the rest of the REFORGER across the Atlantic. The without the additional planes the operation should take fifteen days maybe sixteen. The additional planes would reduce that to maybe twelve or thirteen days. That meant that REFOGER would be completed no later than Saturday. Add on that the 24th Mech had arrived would be totally unloaded by tomorrow and two of the convoys would be unloaded while the third two ship convoy would be finished the day after tomorrow. That would mean that almost all of the equipment for the 1st Cavalry and 2ND Armored division would have arrived.
The other bit of really good news was that with the arrival of the M-1’s for the 1st Calvary was on the RO/RO ships that would give Central Command a full three divisions with M-1 Abrams. That would mean that all the M-60A3 that were formerly the assigned to the 1St Cav and the 2nd Armored could to be used for other missions like maybe giving the tanks to a guard division and putting the M-48A5’s into the war reserve. That was an idea maybe he should have someone take a closer look at the idea. Looking around the room he commented on the idea and there was a positive response on the idea. Then General Rogers turned his attention to the next problem.
His chief of staff informed him of a special message from the Pentagon. The 9th was to be shipped to Greece which he was already aware of but they were requesting that at least one battalion of M-60a1 or M-60a3 be assigned to fill out a Guard unit being sent to Greece. The reason is that the General Rogers was well aware of why the 9th and her attached units were on the way to Greece. Also, since he was the senior commander of NATO so he had to take in consideration all of NATO’s front areas. Greece and Turkey, Balkan front was one of those frontline areas. What they were requesting was for one battalion to make the arrival of one of the attached units a little easier.
One of the other officers, who was watching General Rogers consider the request, commented, **Sir if we move tanks we have in the war reserve to Greece we will weaken Central Command.** General Rogers considered the man for a second and he replied, **I am the senior officer for all of NATO, so I cannot always short changed other fronts just for Central Command.** The other officers in the room were not convince then General Rogers stated, **We have to keep Greece happy since if we don’t she could decide not to mobilize or to cease her mobilization. The 9th is going to keep her happy and since it take a lot of planes to move an infantry division like the 9th so by reducing the number of flights needed to bring the whole division over to Greece we can increase the number of troops were can ship to the Central Command.**
** In doing so we help the alliance and remember if the Red Army and its Warsaw Pact armies can open the Dardanelles for the Soviet Black Seas Fleet, we would be having one hell of a fight in the Med. One we don’t need. The movement of the 9th is strategically necessary to bolster NATO’s southern flank. So, I will order that all tanks and M-113 and its variants that the 9th and attached units need to be taken from the war reserves and shipped to Greece. This will make the movement of the 9th division and it attached and affiliated units even easier. **
Those officers that disagreed with the decision were grumbling but not where General Rogers could hear it. Then General Rogers looked around the room, he had made the decision no he had to have someone make sure the mission of getting the tanks and APC’s. General Bertram has other missions to carry out but he was the one man that Rogers trusted to take care of the special mission and this was the current special mission. **Archie, you’re the one to take care of this little job. ** General Bertram cringed inwardly since he was not pleased with idea of moving tanks and APC’s from the Central Front to what he considered a purely secondary front. But he was too good of an officer not to carry out his orders to the letter and with all possible speed. General Bertram replied **Yes sir. ** Then he left the room to assign this mission to one of his staff members who would do all the heavy lifting.
As the rest of the officers filed out of the officer, General Rogers aide handed him the itinerary for the Secretary of Defenses visit next week which included a meeting with Chancellor Kohl in Bonne.
1 PM Neuwildflecken Germany
The commander of the 7th Army was meeting with representatives of the Bundeswehr the reason for that discussion was that the Bundeswehr which had been temporarily assigned to cover the terrain between the southern edge of the 8th ID and the northern edge of the 3rd ID to the south. The Bundeswehr were insisting that the 25th be pulled out and an American unit take over. But the 3rd ID was pointing out that the reason that that section of the front had been handed over to the Bundeswehr was that the Americans had no light infantry units to take over the mission.
The meeting ended with no decision and the Bundeswehr informed the commander of the 7th Army that they would demand a meeting with General Rogers to get the 25th Fallschirmjaeger returned to their original mission. Both sides would be calling Brussels and by 8 pm orders were sent out. In the end, it would be Brussels that would have to find a solution.
2pm London The Royal Navy planners knew that they had a lot of work to do to convince Prime Minister Thatcher about the value of changing the targeting of the Royal Navies missile boats. But they pointed out that all of the sites could be or were already covered under the SIOP plans of both the Americans and the French so with a little fiddling any first strike target could easily be covered. After all the Americans had put a significant portion of their boomers as they called them in reserves. It would be for the Americans a simply matter of retargeting three or four missile boats missiles and with the new improvements in target what used to take several days now just took hours.
The PM was not initially enthused about the idea proposed by the Royal Navy to attack the IRBM launch sites. First she was not happy about not carrying out attacks on several key strategic targets that in agreement with the United States. She commenting that for it to work everything would have to go just right. The officer doing the briefing did not deny that for one minute. He pointed out that if the missiles were never launched, then the warheads could be retargeted. That way instead of being a waste the missiles warheads could be used as part of a second strike. Of course, of the missile were launched and the IRBM were launch simultaneously, then we fail but if it works we will have crippled the Soviet IRBM forces we estimate that we would destroy between fifty percent seventy percent of the missiles launch sites. He told the Prime Minister that he felt that the attack could cause the Soviet Politburo to delay or even not carry out an all out strike against NATO. But he pointed that if it worked the world would be save and it did not what had they lost.
Then he pointed out that if it works significant sections of the United Kingdom, would not suffer under the attacks of the Soviet Unions IRBM’s. That would mean millions of lives save as well as much less damage to the nation’s infrastructure. That means a less difficult and quicker recovery from the devastation of World War III. Not to mention the millions of lives save throughout Europe. He then reemphasized that history would report that Margaret Thatcher made a difficult decision that save many millions of lives and assured a quicker recovery from both the United Kingdom and Europe. That line of reasoning caught the PM’s attention whether what he said was true he would never know. But all politicians considered their legacy and to fight a nuclear war would be hard on any Prime Ministers legacy. But one that included a tough decision that save millions of lives that was a horse of a different color. Finally after considerable thought Margaret Thatcher decided to allow the Royal Navy to approach the American with their plan to see what they thought. If they agreed to go along with the attack then they could carry out the plan. Now the officers had to arrange for a meeting with the senior US naval officer in the United Kingdom
4pm London Prime Minister Thatcher was holding a special meeting with the Foreign office, Ministry of Defense, MI6 and the Defense Intelligence Staff. The meeting was to discuss the message from the Chinese government. The Ministry of the Defense was more or less in favor of the idea, their attitude that having the Ghurka’s and other units in South Korea would bolster the United States efforts to protect South Korea. Also they were of the opinion that moving the troops from Hong Kong to Pusan would not be all that difficult since the Americans were moving two brigades of equipment into the area. More than enough ships necessary to transport the Ghurka Brigade was available. All you had to do was ask the Americans for ships to move the units. There was a little resistance to the idea but the general attitude was that sending the Ghurka Brigade to Korea and now they needed to talk to the Americans.
8am The Boneyard
In the opinion of some the navy was slow off the mark to bring old and some argued planes to obsolete to risk pilots in combat with them. But the news that even the British had been raiding American and British boneyard to strengthen their forces. The navy had remained disincline to raid the scrap heap as some senior naval aviators commented preferring to push as many new aircraft on line by speeding up the production lines. That attitude had united the Secretary of Defense with the Secretary of the Navy men who were not fans of each other to push the navy to into going out and bring some of the older jets back into service.
This group of officers and petty officers with a few enlisted men were the F-8 Crusader resurrection team as some wag had commented. They were to bring as many of the old crusaders back into service as they could. Right at this moment there advertisements, on TV calling for men who had serviced these and other jets when those jets had been part of America’s first line of defense. Today these planes would be used to fill in holes or to cover areas where a few fighters were needed but little in the way of combat was expected. No one expect more than a few dozen of the crusaders of being resurrected from the boneyard. Unsaid but in the back of the men’s minds was the thought that if it came to war and then Nuclear war. These pieces of junk could once again become Americas front line fighting units once more. Others were scouring through all kinds of air craft god only knew what would be brought back from the graveyard.
1PM Pentagon The people in charge of gathering the convoys had been concentrating on the convoy that was taking the 50th armored equipment to Europe. As well as laying groundwork for the movement of the 49th Armored and the 40th mechanized divisions, that included gathering enough ships to move the entire force at one time. Suddenly they realized that they had not spent much time preparing for the fast convoy. So, they needed to take a look at what was being moved on the fast convoy. Cmdr. Daly give the basic briefing, ** The fast convoy would be leaving Rotterdam on the 3rd of July for Boston and the convoy should arrive on the 8th July. Then figure a three day’s tops to load the ships and then we will send this convoy to Antwerp. We have the 278th Cavalry and the 30th Armored as well as the 45th artillery brigade are the primary units being transport. We also have four TLAT battalions being transported. **
One of the naval officer commented, **TLAT battalions?** Maj General McKenna replied, **You put a Tow on a jeep and man it with a three men crew. They will be a versatile and mobile response to all the Commies tanks when they cross the border. Think Rat Patrol only with TOW’s instead of a Ma deuce. Vice Admiral McCoy smiled to himself he wondered if the naval contingent in the room knew what a Ma deuce and he guessed that at least some knew about the old TV show called the Rat Patrol. He did know what a Ma deuce was, but he had been part of the Riverine forces during its early days in Nam. Then he spoke up, **Well now that we are familiar with this army concept what is the status of the units being sent and how much cargo has been gathered to load the RO/RO ships.**
The briefing officer nodded his head and he replied, Well sir the 30th Armored and the 278th Cavalry equipment has arrived and the 45th Artillery brigade is being transported in and it will arrive in a day or so. As for the TLAT battalions the one from 1-128th and the 1-122nd have arrived and the 2-180th is also from Oklahoma and its being transported on the same train as the 45th that train will arrive in Boston tomorrow. The final battalion 1-249th is coming in from Oregon we are not exactly sure when the battalion will arrive but we understand it will be not later than Friday. As for the transport battalions we are running into a problem some of the battalions are at half of TO&E. You see when we planned this we did not think about the units being under equipped. So, we will be at least a few hundred vehicles short of a full load, but we will have some extra tanks available to fill any open spots for tanks that come up. But as for other vehicle we are in a bit of a bind. **
General McKenna, frowned and then he commented, ** I will look into the matter and check with the units in question. Maybe we can use some of that money the congress appropriated for trucks and fill out those units with farm trucks.** Admiral McCoy grunted and then he replied, **Well make you’re your people find the necessary number of trucks and other vehicles make sure that every ship in the convoy is fully loaded for the voyage over to Europe. I don’t want to have to explain to the JCS aka the Joint Chief of Staff why this convoy went out not filled to capacity. ** General McKenna nodded his head and he agreed, **They will not be happy not one little bit if that happens. **
Then the discussion turned to the news that the fourth ALGOL class ship, the Bellatrix would be in service a lot sooner than anyone would have expected. One major short cut had been the decision to not do all final paint jobs that had been planned. It took a lot of time for paint to dry. Add on the fact that the people working on the Bellatrix worked double shifts and other workers in the shipyard came and helped made the new delivery time achievable. Whole sections of the interior of the ships would be unpainted. But on senior officer commented that they could take care of that problem after the crisis was over. But the lasted completion date would be roughly the two weeks max and then add on a third week for the ship to arrive in Boston.
The commander of the 7th Army was meeting with representatives of the Bundeswehr the reason for that discussion was that the Bundeswehr which had been temporarily assigned to cover the terrain between the southern edge of the 8th ID and the northern edge of the 3rd ID to the south. The Bundeswehr were insisting that the 25th be pulled out and an American unit take over. But the 3rd ID was pointing out that the reason that that section of the front had been handed over to the Bundeswehr was that the Americans had no light infantry units to take over the mission.
The meeting ended with no decision and the Bundeswehr informed the commander of the 7th Army that they would demand a meeting with General Rogers to get the 25th Fallschirmjaeger returned to their original mission. Both sides would be calling Brussels and by 8 pm orders were sent out. In the end, it would be Brussels that would have to find a solution.
2pm London The Royal Navy planners knew that they had a lot of work to do to convince Prime Minister Thatcher about the value of changing the targeting of the Royal Navies missile boats. But they pointed out that all of the sites could be or were already covered under the SIOP plans of both the Americans and the French so with a little fiddling any first strike target could easily be covered. After all the Americans had put a significant portion of their boomers as they called them in reserves. It would be for the Americans a simply matter of retargeting three or four missile boats missiles and with the new improvements in target what used to take several days now just took hours.
The PM was not initially enthused about the idea proposed by the Royal Navy to attack the IRBM launch sites. First she was not happy about not carrying out attacks on several key strategic targets that in agreement with the United States. She commenting that for it to work everything would have to go just right. The officer doing the briefing did not deny that for one minute. He pointed out that if the missiles were never launched, then the warheads could be retargeted. That way instead of being a waste the missiles warheads could be used as part of a second strike. Of course, of the missile were launched and the IRBM were launch simultaneously, then we fail but if it works we will have crippled the Soviet IRBM forces we estimate that we would destroy between fifty percent seventy percent of the missiles launch sites. He told the Prime Minister that he felt that the attack could cause the Soviet Politburo to delay or even not carry out an all out strike against NATO. But he pointed that if it worked the world would be save and it did not what had they lost.
Then he pointed out that if it works significant sections of the United Kingdom, would not suffer under the attacks of the Soviet Unions IRBM’s. That would mean millions of lives save as well as much less damage to the nation’s infrastructure. That means a less difficult and quicker recovery from the devastation of World War III. Not to mention the millions of lives save throughout Europe. He then reemphasized that history would report that Margaret Thatcher made a difficult decision that save many millions of lives and assured a quicker recovery from both the United Kingdom and Europe. That line of reasoning caught the PM’s attention whether what he said was true he would never know. But all politicians considered their legacy and to fight a nuclear war would be hard on any Prime Ministers legacy. But one that included a tough decision that save millions of lives that was a horse of a different color. Finally after considerable thought Margaret Thatcher decided to allow the Royal Navy to approach the American with their plan to see what they thought. If they agreed to go along with the attack then they could carry out the plan. Now the officers had to arrange for a meeting with the senior US naval officer in the United Kingdom
4pm London Prime Minister Thatcher was holding a special meeting with the Foreign office, Ministry of Defense, MI6 and the Defense Intelligence Staff. The meeting was to discuss the message from the Chinese government. The Ministry of the Defense was more or less in favor of the idea, their attitude that having the Ghurka’s and other units in South Korea would bolster the United States efforts to protect South Korea. Also they were of the opinion that moving the troops from Hong Kong to Pusan would not be all that difficult since the Americans were moving two brigades of equipment into the area. More than enough ships necessary to transport the Ghurka Brigade was available. All you had to do was ask the Americans for ships to move the units. There was a little resistance to the idea but the general attitude was that sending the Ghurka Brigade to Korea and now they needed to talk to the Americans.
8am The Boneyard
In the opinion of some the navy was slow off the mark to bring old and some argued planes to obsolete to risk pilots in combat with them. But the news that even the British had been raiding American and British boneyard to strengthen their forces. The navy had remained disincline to raid the scrap heap as some senior naval aviators commented preferring to push as many new aircraft on line by speeding up the production lines. That attitude had united the Secretary of Defense with the Secretary of the Navy men who were not fans of each other to push the navy to into going out and bring some of the older jets back into service.
This group of officers and petty officers with a few enlisted men were the F-8 Crusader resurrection team as some wag had commented. They were to bring as many of the old crusaders back into service as they could. Right at this moment there advertisements, on TV calling for men who had serviced these and other jets when those jets had been part of America’s first line of defense. Today these planes would be used to fill in holes or to cover areas where a few fighters were needed but little in the way of combat was expected. No one expect more than a few dozen of the crusaders of being resurrected from the boneyard. Unsaid but in the back of the men’s minds was the thought that if it came to war and then Nuclear war. These pieces of junk could once again become Americas front line fighting units once more. Others were scouring through all kinds of air craft god only knew what would be brought back from the graveyard.
1PM Pentagon The people in charge of gathering the convoys had been concentrating on the convoy that was taking the 50th armored equipment to Europe. As well as laying groundwork for the movement of the 49th Armored and the 40th mechanized divisions, that included gathering enough ships to move the entire force at one time. Suddenly they realized that they had not spent much time preparing for the fast convoy. So, they needed to take a look at what was being moved on the fast convoy. Cmdr. Daly give the basic briefing, ** The fast convoy would be leaving Rotterdam on the 3rd of July for Boston and the convoy should arrive on the 8th July. Then figure a three day’s tops to load the ships and then we will send this convoy to Antwerp. We have the 278th Cavalry and the 30th Armored as well as the 45th artillery brigade are the primary units being transport. We also have four TLAT battalions being transported. **
One of the naval officer commented, **TLAT battalions?** Maj General McKenna replied, **You put a Tow on a jeep and man it with a three men crew. They will be a versatile and mobile response to all the Commies tanks when they cross the border. Think Rat Patrol only with TOW’s instead of a Ma deuce. Vice Admiral McCoy smiled to himself he wondered if the naval contingent in the room knew what a Ma deuce and he guessed that at least some knew about the old TV show called the Rat Patrol. He did know what a Ma deuce was, but he had been part of the Riverine forces during its early days in Nam. Then he spoke up, **Well now that we are familiar with this army concept what is the status of the units being sent and how much cargo has been gathered to load the RO/RO ships.**
The briefing officer nodded his head and he replied, Well sir the 30th Armored and the 278th Cavalry equipment has arrived and the 45th Artillery brigade is being transported in and it will arrive in a day or so. As for the TLAT battalions the one from 1-128th and the 1-122nd have arrived and the 2-180th is also from Oklahoma and its being transported on the same train as the 45th that train will arrive in Boston tomorrow. The final battalion 1-249th is coming in from Oregon we are not exactly sure when the battalion will arrive but we understand it will be not later than Friday. As for the transport battalions we are running into a problem some of the battalions are at half of TO&E. You see when we planned this we did not think about the units being under equipped. So, we will be at least a few hundred vehicles short of a full load, but we will have some extra tanks available to fill any open spots for tanks that come up. But as for other vehicle we are in a bit of a bind. **
General McKenna, frowned and then he commented, ** I will look into the matter and check with the units in question. Maybe we can use some of that money the congress appropriated for trucks and fill out those units with farm trucks.** Admiral McCoy grunted and then he replied, **Well make you’re your people find the necessary number of trucks and other vehicles make sure that every ship in the convoy is fully loaded for the voyage over to Europe. I don’t want to have to explain to the JCS aka the Joint Chief of Staff why this convoy went out not filled to capacity. ** General McKenna nodded his head and he agreed, **They will not be happy not one little bit if that happens. **
Then the discussion turned to the news that the fourth ALGOL class ship, the Bellatrix would be in service a lot sooner than anyone would have expected. One major short cut had been the decision to not do all final paint jobs that had been planned. It took a lot of time for paint to dry. Add on the fact that the people working on the Bellatrix worked double shifts and other workers in the shipyard came and helped made the new delivery time achievable. Whole sections of the interior of the ships would be unpainted. But on senior officer commented that they could take care of that problem after the crisis was over. But the lasted completion date would be roughly the two weeks max and then add on a third week for the ship to arrive in Boston.
James G sorry about such a late response but I was at work when I found out about your response. I waited until I returned home to answer. Your right about the flexibility of these TOW units. They are not to be used in large numbers I feel that the best usage as an attachment to a calvary unit. Carrying out screening operations. They should be used in small number like snipers picking off targets a range and never ever staying in one spot once they have fired and hit or missed. Then it get the hell out of here time.
I envision the units being used to delay advancing units forcing especially if the American army is pulling back from one position to another. The jeep operating in groups of two to four units, the first force picking one or two tanks or APC or IFV then falling back past the other two jeeps. then those two jeep pick off a couple of targets and repeat the process a sort of reverse bounding over watch. By doing that the jeep should not give the other side much chance to pick them off. As for artillery attack these jeep well if the jeep do what they are supposed to do then they are never one place long enough for the artillery to hit them unless the artillery starts taking out whole kilometers of territory at a time. Actually I would be more afraid of the roving Hind D then Soviet Artillery.
The only reason these units should be involved in a standup battle is if the line is broken and the enemy is pouring through and you need to plug holes and fast. I hope to showcase the operation of these units, the effectiveness and their weaknesses.
Anyone feel free to comment, disagree or suggest possible ideas I have eighteen one day chapter to write about the war so input is welcome. After all August is coming slowly but surely.
I envision the units being used to delay advancing units forcing especially if the American army is pulling back from one position to another. The jeep operating in groups of two to four units, the first force picking one or two tanks or APC or IFV then falling back past the other two jeeps. then those two jeep pick off a couple of targets and repeat the process a sort of reverse bounding over watch. By doing that the jeep should not give the other side much chance to pick them off. As for artillery attack these jeep well if the jeep do what they are supposed to do then they are never one place long enough for the artillery to hit them unless the artillery starts taking out whole kilometers of territory at a time. Actually I would be more afraid of the roving Hind D then Soviet Artillery.
The only reason these units should be involved in a standup battle is if the line is broken and the enemy is pouring through and you need to plug holes and fast. I hope to showcase the operation of these units, the effectiveness and their weaknesses.
Anyone feel free to comment, disagree or suggest possible ideas I have eighteen one day chapter to write about the war so input is welcome. After all August is coming slowly but surely.
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From 1976 to 1977 I served in the 3d Battalion, 60th Infantry, a part of the 9th Infantry Division, where we had TOW mounted jeeps. The battalion was "leg" infantry and only 65% totally mobile. What you have described for TOW jeep daytime usage is very true. They are fast, easy to conceal and terribly vulnerable to artillery fire. What you haven't described however was their superb night time use. The TOW sight was an early version of a thermal sight and extremely useful at night. We would try to pair our TOW jeeps with our Scout jeeps (think Rat Patrol with machineguns) at night and send them out on night outposts/screens.
In my opinion the TOW jeep was a good defensive weapon, it was not very useful in an offensive operation due to its lack of crew protection.
In my opinion the TOW jeep was a good defensive weapon, it was not very useful in an offensive operation due to its lack of crew protection.
The NVG aspect of TOW is important. while US capabilities in 1984 are not what they were even 5 years later, the Soviets were way behind. The US forces will own the night which will disrupt the Soviet advances. Especially at night, sniping at armor is going to be highly disruptive. Trying to get artillery on a TOW jeep pair that displaces rapidly after 1-2 shots won't be easy during the daytime, at night even harder and is going to result in some "friendly fire" incidents which won't help Soviet morale. Losses in the "rat patrol" teams are going to be high over time, that is a price that has to be paid. Any units involved in rear guard type actions are going to take losses, and frankly it is not unusual to write off such units either to complete loss or to such heavy losses they need to be pulled off the line. Such is war.